The present invention relates generally to fabricating a self-formed nanometer pore, and more specifically, to forming a self-formed nanometer pore array at the wafer scale.
A solid state nanopore is a nanometer pore on a free-standing single or multi-layer membrane, like silicon nitride, silicon dioxide, and titanium nitride/silicon dioxide stack. The solid state nanopore is being widely used to detect individual characteristics of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), ribonucleic acid (RNA), and protein at single molecule scale, and is very promising technology for next-generation personal genome sequencing.
Nanopore sequencing is a method for determining the order in which nucleotides occur on a strand of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). A nanopore (also referred to as a pore, nanochannel, hole, etc.) can be a small hole in the order of several nanometers in internal diameter. The theory behind nanopore sequencing is about what occurs when the nanopore is immersed in a conducting fluid and an electric potential (voltage) is applied across the nanopore. Under these conditions, a slight electric current due to conduction of ions through the nanopore can be measured, and the amount of current is very sensitive to the size and shape of the nanopore. If single bases or strands of DNA pass (or part of the DNA molecule passes) through the nanopore, this can create a change in the magnitude of the current through the nanopore. Other electrical or optical sensors can also be positioned around the nanopore so that DNA bases can be differentiated while the DNA passes through the nanopore.